


Not a happy day

by Somecallmemichelle



Category: Degrassi High
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, Bittersweet Ending, Friendship, Gen, Grandmother - Freeform, Growing Apart, Growing Up, Guilt, Resentment, Strained Friendships, not sneels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-19
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-08-31 20:17:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8592085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Somecallmemichelle/pseuds/Somecallmemichelle
Summary: Snake has this whole thing figured out. - As he's going straight, he's slowly been drifting apart from Wheels. They don't hang together all that much anymore. So he planned a day with him, a Saturday afternoon filled with whatever, just to get close to his friend again.As soon as he gets there however, he can't shake the feeling of guilt. A feeling that may just interfere with the afternoon he has in mind.





	

Wheels’ grandma acknowledged him with a glum nod as she opened the door, but otherwise ignored him. She yelled to Derek (Snake hadn’t called Wheels that since ever) that his friend was there and there was the sound of feet shuffling, somewhere in the house. Snake didn’t feel too comfortable just entering the house, but Wheels was waiting for him, and the boy could be moody, with a perfect smile that was intended to apologise for the intrusion, like he was invading her personal space and he was oh so terribly sorry for it, he entered the house.

 

Derek’s (Wheels) grandmother was looking at him, and  he was is so terribly aware of the fact, as he walked in and he rattled his brain trying to figure out something to tell her, to make them both at ease. Heck, he doesn’t even know what to call her, “Miss?”, “My friend’s Grandma?”, Wheels called her all sorts of things, many of them offensive, but he doesn’t see the point in harming the old lady’s feelings.

 

He eventually settles for an “Excuse me, miss” as he enters and proceeds to walk to where the shuffling is. As expected there is Wheels, doing his best impression of a man who has just told he had to go to war, or to jail, or something. He doesn’t know. The point is, Wheels is psyching himself up, sweat falling out of his brow, as he tries and waits to do something….but what? After all, though everybody wants something, Snake is not aware of what exactly Wheels does want.

 

As soon as Wheels sees him, his whole behavior changes. - He gets himself straight, he smiles, he looks relieved for some reason. Snake noted that Wheels was glad to see him, but beyond that there wasn’t much of else he could think of that’d make him understand the sudden shift.

 

“Hey man, did you get inside ok? Did my crap Grandmother say anything?”

 

“Crap” is mild for Wheels, that, though he doesn’t swear all that much, can be pretty imagine with his insults, combining them into descriptions of unforeseeable horror. And yet he’s still failing English, somehow. Snake approaches, not knowing whether in his face there’s a grin, or a grim smile, and replies. - He doesn’t know exactly how to feel, after all Wheels told him, Snake would have expected the woman to have bat wings and be sprouting fire (not literally, of course, but as a way of speech), but instead she just looked...sad. No yelling at him, no scorn in her voice...She just looked like a perfectly regular grandmother, in a perfectly average homelife.

 

“Well, no, she was just…” - Just what? What was he going to say? What could he say? It was as if the air was just sucked out of his breath, and he couldn’t really say much. - “...fine” - He said, his voice barely louder than a whisper.

 

He was starting to feel guilty for all the talk they had about Wheels’ Grandma.

 

Wheels ignored the way Snake had finished the sentence. Maybe he didn’t notice, maybe he didn’t care, he had his own version of events to tell.   
  
“She must like you then!” - He smiled, and for a moment his face that was so filled with scorn lately looked young and unpreoccupied, just like before certain events in his life. That was a look that was soon replaced by the usual sneer in his face though. - “Wish she liked me too! But that is life! Anyway…”

 

“She does like you, you’re her grandkid.” - Snake doesn’t know why he feels the need to step in for the old lady that had silently welcomed him into her house, Snake doesn’t know why he’s opposing Wheels of all people, who has made his feelings pretty clear on the matter. But the fact is, he is.

 

“Yeah! Nice way of showing it, controlling my life!” - Wheels replies, his voice a few degrees of sound higher than Snake. Snake realises he is dangerously close to a meltdown, to start screaming and storming around in the room.

 

He thinks about telling him to calm down, but he knows that telling people to calm down when they are agitated just makes things worse, his best chance, he figures, is to get right to the next point, this one didn’t even exist until he raised it.

 

“...so, hum, what do you want to do? I hear that you’ve got vhs, is that right?”

 

Wheels muttered something about his grandfather and the tv, which led Snake to the conclusion that he didn’t have much of a chance of watching a movie today. Not that he needed one, it was just that they couldn’t very well sit around and do nothing for an entire afternoon.

  
He had once been close and tight with Wheels. - They’d been as family, together in pretty much all situations. But now that Snake was going straight, intent on making the best of his life, or as Wheels called it “Being a sheep”, they hadn’t talked much lately.

 

He had hoped that by coming here he could have made things better for the both of them, and that they could rekindle their friendship into what it had been before. That however, didn’t seem to be happening much.

 

“We could play cards!” - Wheels suggested, and Snake did his best to smile and pretend like there was nothing wrong with his head. At least that’d keep him out of trouble, really, Not many problems he could think of that Wheels could find in playing a single deck of cards. He nodded as Wheels retrieved the cards from somewhere in his room and brought them to him.

 

“You shuffle” - He elaborated, showing him the pristine deck of cards that had barely been opened. Snake guessed that between girl, Karen, his stupid moves on Stephanie. The whole band thing, and all the crazy stuff he’d gotten to over the last couple years, he hadn’t really had time to play cards. Shaking his head he shuffled the deck, before a question came to his head.

  
“What exactly kind of card game are we playing?” - He notices the back of the cards for the first time, thinly dressed women, Joey would like it...yet that only makes him feel guiltier

 

“C’mon, man, do it.” - Snake’s hands did the task, but his head was filled with conflicting thoughts. Thoughts he doesn’t want to have about his best friend.

 

“I...hum” - It’s no use, really, he really doesn’t feel all that well, like he’s been carsick, or really, any other kind of sickness. Maybe that is it. Probably not.

 

He gives the cards back to Wheels, the women in them burned into his mind. He stands up.

 

“Where are you going?”

 

Snake doesn’t know, he had such plans...an entire afternoon, but he can’t handle it. Not right now. He knows it’s such a clichê line, but it truly isn’t Wheels, it’s him, he’s feeling awfully weird.

 

“Home, forget it, I’ll see you at school.” -  _ If he shows up _ \- his mind adds, but he doesn’t say that part out-loud, he doesn’t want to spoil things more.    
  


Wheels just looks confused at the outburst, but he shrugs and goes on fixing things anyway, Snake turns and leaves.

 

On the way out he sees Wheels grandma, his chest threaten to burn with guilt. He knows the way out, he briefly nods and then he leaves.

 

The cold air feels good on his face, yet he can’t help but think something is wrong. Today hadn’t been a happy day.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> So, hum, yeah, I didn't have such a good day. I think I may be harboring feelings of resentment for a whole lot of things, and it translates in the writing. But I hope you enjoyed it. Thank you for reading.


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